Summer Odds 'n Ends

Rub-a-dub-dub, three cuties in a tub!

 This girl. Love her!

 

 I semi-successfully made Gracen a mermaid tail for swimming. :/

 Eli's "ice cream" store.

 It's amazing how entertained the kids are by the phone!

 Welcoming Dad home after his 24 hour shift!

 Jaron had to work on the day of Stake Conference so I ended up taking all the kids myself.  It did not go well so we came home and practiced reverence on the couch. :D

 This is the mess that Reed makes EVERY time he eats cereal. I have to wipe the table, the chair, and the floor.  It's terrible.  Especially in contrast to Isabel's sweet manners next to him!

 This is mine and Jaron's bed, every morning.  I love it and will be so sad when it doesn't happen anymore!

 Rocking this girl to sleep is one of my favoritest things.

 

 Thanks to our great friends the Hiatts, sometimes Jaron and I get to go on dates.

This night we went bowling and had a blast.  It's been years since we bowled!  I didn't give Jaron much of a challenge but what else is new?!

Biking the Bridge

We absolutely love the canyon and biking the bridge.  We're going to miss this beauteous landscape when we move away next summer!

I know, my camera is very blurry. :( Makes me sad.

 Reed made motorcycle sounds with his mouth the whole way across. :D  He's getting pretty fast on his little Strider bike!

Summer School

I think I always have good intentions at the beginning of summer.  After all, we're going to have all this time on our hands - think of all we'll accomplish! :D 

This year I decided we would do some summer school activities to keep those creative juices flowing.  We made a "star chart" and for each activity or 3 workbook sheets or 20 minutes of reading the kids earned a star.  With their stars they could buy treats or extra Wii time or earn money.  The activities only lasted about halfway through summer but the kids continued to earn stars all the way through.  Here are a few of the activities that I took pictures.  All of the ideas are from Pinterest, of course!

Lego minifigure playground. (Once in awhile Alden puts a shirt on, I swear!)

 Magnet ladybug maze.

 Garbage marble run.

The art of bubbles.

 Building a Lego boat that could hold the most pennies. A combination of depth and area seemed to be the secret!

Overall, it was a fantastic experience.  I didn't put pressure on myself to do it everyday, we just did it whenever we had time or whenever the kids wanted to.  I wish I had taken pictures of more of what we had done!  It's still August and I already can't remember many of the activities!

Baseball

My camera is so terribly blurry (maybe because I left my phone on the back of the seat of the car and it flew across the car while I was driving?) that I'm not even going to make these pictures big.  They're too hard to look at. :(

But we had another great baseball season. 

Dad was out of town learning colonoscopies for much of it. :(

Cute little baseball babe!

 Reed set up his chair down the way because he's already too cool to sit with us! :D

In the middle of the season, I hate taking all my kids to every game and how it uses up 3 hours of almost every evening.  After the season is over, I love all that my kids learned and how they grew and all the new friends they made. :D 

 Reed, trying his hardest not to let me take his picture.  Let me tell ya, he's pretty darn cute when he's trying to play catch like the big boys!

Cheering on Alden.

 Apparently this is the only picture I took of Alden at baseball.  He's jumping up and down, cheering on his team.  Major mom fail. :(